18th Global CemFuels Conference & Exhibition on alternative fuels and hydrogen for cement and lime 2025
17 - 18 September 2025, Milan, Italy
#CemFuels
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Call for Papers
- This is the call for papers for the Global CemFuels Conference. The Conference will concentrate on practical issues involved with increasing the use of sustainable alternative fuels for the production of cement and lime, including hydrogen. The conference organisers are interested to hear from companies or individuals who are interested in presenting a first class paper at the Global CemFuels Conference. All presentations will be 20 minutes in length, with an additional 10 minutes at the end of each presentation for questions and discussions. All presenters should use PowerPoint software.
- Following delegate feedback, equipment manufacturers and service providers wishing to speak are requested to partner with a waste-producer/processor or fuels producer (such as Biffa, Viridor, N&P etc), or cement producer/waste-user employee (eg Cemex, Ash Grove, Anhui Conch, Votorantim, Dangote etc) to author their paper in which case the fuel/cement producer must be one of the named authors on the paper.
- Presenters must register for the conference. Confirmed cement producer speakers can register for the conference at no cost.
- In the first instance, all prospective presenters should contact the conference convenor, Dr Robert McCaffrey, with a title and author list , as soon as possible, to rob@propubs.com
- Presentation slots are not confirmed until the presentation title has been agreed with the conference convenor.
- Presentations are generally scheduled in the order in which they are confirmed.
- Authors should either download the conference presentation template by clicking here or should add the conference logo below to a corner of each of their own slides.
The deadline for receipt of the 100-word biography and finalised PowerPoint file for the Global CemFuels Conference proceedings volume is Friday 5 September 2025.
A note for prospective presenters: Presentation slots are not confirmed until the presentation has been explicitly agreed and confirmed with the conference convenor. Slots are filled on a first-come, first-served basis: late-comers may be added to a waiting list at the discretion of the convenor. The programme order is decided by the convenor, giving due regard to the order in which presentations are received and the themes of the conference. You are advised to confirm your presentation title with the convenor as early as possible!
Main Themes
- Permits and permitting
- Legislation
- Safety and health
- Practical considerations
- Combustion efficiency
- Cost benefits
- Community relations
Thank you for your efforts!
Tips for speakers
We’ve had the pleasure of sitting through literally thousands of presentations over the years. In that time, we have seen some really terrific presentations, where the audience was literally on the edge of its seat, and where listeners waited for every utterance as if their lives depended upon it. We have also heard a few presentations that were not so good. We thought we would take the opportunity to give a few hints to potential speakers...
What not to do...
• Don’t give an advertisement. The audience didn’t pay to come to the conference to listen to you trying to sell them something. They really hate this (we know, they tell us). Tell the audience something useful that they can take home. In fact, if you give them something useful and interesting, then the audience will forgive many other failings - but they won’t forgive you trying to sell them something for 25 minutes (and they won’t forget it either). Keep your company information to ONE slide.
• Don’t read from a script, even if you think you need to. One of the best presentations we ever saw started as a deadly-dull script-based talk. Half way through, the presenter lost his place and did the rest from memory - it was excellent (he went on to win the best presentation prize...).
• Don’t stand too close to the microphone: think of your listeners. You wouldn’t shout in their ears... and standing at a sensible distance from the mike also avoids ‘popping,’ where a pronounced ‘p’ can make an amplified booming sound.
• Don’t have too many slides: We once saw a presenter try to get through 125 slides in 25 minutes (that’s 12 seconds per slide). 25 slides should be your absolute maximum.
• Don’t try to be too clever. If you get lost in your own powerpoint, you will have lost your audience a long time ago.
• Don’t talk too fast, especially if you have a strong accent. This applies to native-English speakers as well!
• Never ask for questions in the middle or at the end: Questions in the middle break up the flow of your talk. Even if you have given a good talk and you ask for questions at the end, you will inevitably be confronted by an embarrassing silence. At the end, simply say “Thank you very much.” There will be applause: Then the chairman will ask for questions. Simple.
• Don’t try to get too much information across: If you can only get the audience to take home three pieces of information (which might still be asking too much) consider which three are most important (to you*)...
• That thing about ‘tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them, and then tell them what you’ve told them’? Don’t bother. Please just spend your time telling us your interesting story - we don't need to be told it three times. Also, you might need to know the underlying structure of your talk, but we probably do not.
What to do...
• Follow the instructions for authors - supply all the materials and hit all the deadlines (the conference convenor/moderator is your friend... don’t rile him!)
• When you get to the conference, check to make sure that your presentation runs as you expect it to (including any movies).
• Familiarise yourself with the lectern/computer/microphone/laser pointer etc well before your alloted presentation time. On the day, don’t blame anyone else if you didn’t do your homework!
• Tell a story. All good presentations have a start, a middle and an end. Often it might be ‘We had a problem, this is what we did to fix it and this is how it all turned out.’ Or it might be ‘The industry is in this situation, we’ve invented machine X, this is how it can benefit you.’ Or 'This is the way the industry was, these are the current trends and this is what the industry will look like in X years.' A good talk needs a structure. Take the audience on a journey - tell us a story.
• Use pictures or video to help tell your story (but make sure that you have supplied your video in a format that can be used by the conference computers).
• Think about your audience at all times: What will make them listen to you and take on board what you are telling them?
• Content is king: *Think about what the audience will find most useful as a take-home as well.
• Make all slides readable from the back: I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve heard “You might not be able to read this, but...” If in doubt, leave it out. Better still, make graphs or infographics out of your tables of numbers. Tables of numbers in a presentation are a waste of space and a wasted opportunity.
• Open your mouth to let the words come out. Use your voice carefully: not too high or too low, not too fast or too slow: speak carefully and be aware as well of the power of silence.
• Use body language if required: connect with your audience (for example by trying to look into the eyes of every one of your listeners at least once during the presentation). Wandering about will distract your audience from your message. Never walk down the central aisle to speak from behind the front-most members of the audience - it is creepy!
• Smile: the audience wants you to succeed!
If you follow our tips, you will be in with a chance of winning the ‘Best Presentation Award.’
Good luck!
